First container train departs from Ukraine to China
Ukraine has strengthened its footprint on the New Silk Road. More than a year ago, UZ, the state-owned railway company, handled the first batch of boxes from China. This week, the first eastbound train departed from Kyiv to China. In 18 days, it will reach its final destination, Xi’an.
The first Ukraine-China container train departed from the Liski intermodal terminal of the Ukrainian Railway (UZ) in Kyiv on Tuesday, 28 September. 43 forty-foot boxes were loaded with locally made sawn timber. After 18 days of transit via Russia and Kazakhstan, it will deliver the mentioned goods to the Chinese city of Xi’an. “Today we are departing the first container train with Ukrainian freight to China. We plan that such trains will become regular,” Oleksandr Kamyshin, acting CEO of UZ, said at the official launching ceremony.
China-Ukraine trains
Earlier, there were running only the westbound container trains between China and Ukraine. The first wagonset with Chinese goods arrived in Kyiv on 8 June 2020. By the end of the past year, 22 container trains from China successfully reached Ukraine. In mid-September of the current year, the Ukrainian Railway (UZ) set a milestone by accepting the 50th train from China. Most of the Chinese trains have the same final destination in Ukraine, namely the capital city of Kyiv. However, some of them ran to Odesa. The other major cities in Ukraine, including Kharkiv, Dnipro or Lviv, could also become the hubs for the China-Ukraine rail freight traffic.